Digital radio voice communications are becoming more commonly used in the radio spectrum. This is due to the various improvements offered over traditional analogue voice radio systems. Unfortunately for radio scanner hobbyists, digital radio is difficult to receive, as special radio scanners which can be expensive are required to decode the digital signal. Additionally, digital radio systems can be encrypted making it impossible for communications to be decoded by a hobbyist. However, most users of digital radio do not bother to encrypt their systems as it can introduce lag, monetary expense and extra battery drain in portable radios.

The most common digital speech codec is APCO P25, which DSD is able to decode. DSD is also capable of decoding other common digital codecs such as DMR/MOTOTRBO, NXDN, D-STAR and ProVoice which no hardware scanner is currently capable of.

Super cheap software defined radios such as the RTL-SDR can be used to decode these digital voice communication signals instead of expensive radio scanners. While this tutorial is aimed at the RTL-SDR, other software radios such as the Funcube dongle, Airspy, HackRF and BladeRF will also work. Hardware radios with discriminator taps connected to a PC may also work.

Examples of DSD Decoding Digital Voice with RTL-SDR as a Radio Scanner

YouTube user Geoff Wolf shows a video where he uses RTL-SDR as a police scanner to listen to public safety P25 digital radio using DSD, SDRSharp and virtual audio cable.

It is assumed you have an RTL-SDR dongle set up and working with SDRSharp. If not, see the Buy RTL-SDR, and Quickstart pages first before attempting this tutorial.

There are two different version of DSD that need to be mentioned. There is DSD 1.7 which is open source software that is under active development and there is DSD+ which is closed source software. DSD+ has vastly superior decoding especially for weak signals but it cannot yet decode D-STAR. DSD 1.7 has poorer decoding, but it is capable of decoding D-STAR. To download each version of DSD see the links below. Once downloaded extract the contents zip file to a folder on your PC.

Compilation instructions and a binary download of DSD 1.7 can be found on this post. Note that the binary download is at the end of the post.

Next you will need an audio piping utility such as the paid version of Virtual Audio Cable or the free VB-Cable. Also ensure virtual audio cable or VB-cable is set as the default recording audio device in windows sound properties as DSD will use the default sound device.

If you are unfamiliar with what a digital voice signal may look like, two waterfall examples are shown below, with audio examples recorded in NFM mode.

D-STAR

Open SDRSharp and set the audio output to Virtual Audio Cable or VB-cable.

Set the receive mode to NFM, with a bandwidth of about 12.5 kHz.

Tune to a digital voice signal frequency. You will need to Google for these frequencies by your location. The radioreference databases may be a good place to start looking for these frequencies. Most digital voice frequencies for many countries will be around 460 MHz or 850 – 900 MHz. D-STAR frequencies are usually at around 145.670 MHz.

To use DSD 1.7 for D-STAR: Open a command prompt from Start->All Programs->Accessories->Command Prompt, and navigate to the folder where DSD 1.7 is located. For those who are not familiar with the command prompt, use the “cd” command to change directories within command prompt. For example, if your DSD 1.7 folder is located in c:\Radio\dsd-1.7, you would type in command prompt “cd c:\Radio\dsd-1.7″.

Now type into the command prompt the command “dsd -i /dev/dsp -o /dev/dsp -fd” to begin decoding. This will use the default sound device set in Windows sound recording properties

To use DSD+: Simply double click on the DSDPlus.exe executable and the GUI will open up.

At this point, text should be scrolling through the command prompt window when a digital signal is broadcasting. Whenever someone speaks into the radio you should see the words “voice” in the window and hear voice.

DSD Command PromptDSD+ GUI Windows

DSD+ can also be used to decode LRRP signals from Motorola (MOTOTRBO/DMR) radio signals. Some Motorola radio broadcast GPS coordinates every few minutes or on request. This is useful for tracking a fleet of vehicles for instance. To show decoded LRRP coordinates on a map when using DSD+, simply open LRRP.exe. Note that many LRRP radio users use a third party GPS software system which cannot be decoded by DSD+. If you do not see any coordinates in the DSD+ event log when an LRRP event occurs this may be the case.

To get good decodes (for most sound cards), the volume settings in SDRSharp and Windows should be played with until decoding begins to improve.

To stop DSD, simply press “ctrl + c” at the command prompt while it is running.

Some Tips

If you don’t know what P25, MOTOTRBO, ProVoice or any digital voice signals sound like, this page has some more example audio files.

You can simply manually scan through various signals, and see if DSD starts scrolling text to see if a signal is supported. DSD will start attempting to decode immediately. Note however that DSD will also scroll text on trunking channels, but will not be able to decode them. See the next section for information on decoding trunking channels.

A strong signal is required for DSD to decode audio well. Ensure you are using a good antenna and have set the RTL-SDR gain correctly.

DSD will listen to the default windows sound recording device. Make sure virtual audio cable or VB-cable is set as the default device. No text will be scrolling within DSD if the wrong audio device is used.

Stereo mix can be used, but you will be hearing both the digital signal as well as the decoded voice at the same time. Also, the decoded voice audio will be pumped back into DSD causing a detrimental feedback loop.

DSD is software in development and may not perform as well as a commercial digital radio.

More Advanced Digital Radio Scanning

We can set up a digital trunking radio scanner using these tools, two RTL-SDR dongles and another piece of software called Unitrunker. See our Unitrunker Trunking tutorial for information on setting this up.

If you enjoyed this tutorial you may like our ebook available on Amazon.

56 comments

After almost 2 years of not having time for this I am glad to say i am back at it again. It all works fine except when decoding P25, I get broken audio pieces and on the DOS screen it shows alot of E’s and R’s along with a few lines of “Unrecoverable” messages. I am on the right path, but it may just need some fine tuning. Maybe increase my band with from 25000 to a higher band with? Does anybody have any suggestions or have had the same issues and what did you do to correct it? Thanks. 73

Hello everyone I am new and inexperience
I’m getting a “Error – The system cannot find the file specified” when I try to start DSD
I downloaded DSD+ and followed the instructions.
I didn’t use cgywin because I read that I didn’t need to download it for DSD+
Can anyone help?

I am not an informatics programmer so all the c++ or cygwin or link with no folder: I waist my time. So please don’t complicate all the information. I want something plug and play.
I thank you in advance for your time.

Great blog .fantastic.
May I ask a quick question on dsd please ?…
“The data that is displayed when dsd is receiving a signal, does this contain colour codes, groups etc ?
I’m thinking of using scanner/dsd to obtain the data so I can then program my digital handheld directly via its software…I hope that wasnt a dumb question and I aplologise in advance if this is the wrong way to ask your advice”
Thanks again – Kevin

I setup everyting as you described and it works in so far that I see DSD output with many = and R and E and I hear audio. But what I hear is cut off pieces, maybe 400 ms long and then about the same time silence. I tried all combinations of -xr and -fr and volume settings but nothing has an effect on this behavior. I’m listening to DB0NJ and DB0TVM repeaters with strong signals. Don’t think they are encrypted as this should not be allowed in HAM radio.

Hello. Thank you for this very well written and updated tutorial. I have followed all of the instructions to decode DMR and all I am hearing is this constant tone when I click “Play”. I’ve fiddled around the software a bit and have not been able to get this to go away. Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Hello.
Using a laptop and VB-Cable and the software decodes well. However, no sound comes out from the speakers. But what should I do / set? I still do not understand …
Using Windows 7.
Thanks in advance!

Hey, i am running dsd, with all the settings, i receive an error: unknown burst 1101 somrthing like that, i can see DMR, filter name, and slot voice, but the voice is too bad!!!
Also, i run a dipole antenna, could you please give some instructions, about length, polarity, etc?
Any other cheap or homemade antennafor dsd decoding? (DMR in my region, runs at 400-430 MHZ)

Ok. Now I am getting scrolling of P25 channel, but no voice decode coming out of the speaker. Speaker is set to default so I know that’s not the problem. I can send you a screen shot. How can I get a screen shot to you?

Per your other comment, it is possible that the signal strength isn’t good enough. When I use DSD, my signals are usually about 30db above the noise floor. Also are you sure the P25 channel is unencrypted?

To show a screen shot use an image service like http://imgur.com/, then link to it here, or attach it in a post in the forum.

Hello. Here is a screenshot of DSD160 scrolling, but so sound. All my settings are correct as far as my soundcard settings, etc. Can you tell from this DOS screenshot if anything is out of the ordinary? Frustrating because the software definitely hears the channel and scrolls, but again no sound decoded. [IMG]http://i.imgur.com/qzx6bb9.jpg[/IMG]

Nope it’s not a trunking channel. It’s one single channel. 159.150 Mhz in Apco 25. I think I am going to give up though. Spent enough time on this for now. Signal is strong (only 11 miles from the tower), volumes are set correctly and all else is set fine. Thank you for your help anyway.

Hello there!
I am working with E4000 Dongle, Sharp SDR and DSD wich all working perfect. I am receiving some DMR-Channel, wich are decoded very well. but i did not hear any decoded synthezised voice over the speaker.
If i set DSD with option -w to set a wave-file, that wave file will work fine. But i want to hear live. Did i set something wrong? I set input- and output device with VB-Cable to default. I am using Windows7 32bit version. How can i make it possible?

What type of signal are you attempting to decoding? Getting garbled voice sounds like the signal might be an inverted DMR. If it is DMR, invert the signal with the -xr flag. You might also get garbled voice if the channel is encrypted, nothing you can do then. Try playing with the Windows volume settings as well.

I’d probably avoid trying to go through SDR# with a hardware radio, just adds another step of failure. Plus, I think you’re probably getting the audio spectrum in the waterfall, and not the RF spectrum. I don’t think SDR# will work well like that.

Help! I have SDR Sharp working great, as far as listening to many frequencies goes and it works great, but when I want to switch over the SDR output to VAC so I can decode and listen to P25 frequencies, nothing happens on the DSD screen. I know I have VAC installed correctly, am tuned to a known P25 frequency with a strong signal, but it’s almost like VAC doesn’t hear anything so no scrolling or decoding happens. Any suggestions? Any settings I should look at? Help!!!!

Hi, check the windows sound screen (by right clicking the speaker icon and going to playback devices) verify that the volume meter for VAC is showing sound output. The other thing is to make 100% sure that VAC is your default sound device by disabling all the other devices you have in the recording devices screen (such as stereo mix). Finally, if VAC still doesn’t work, try VBCable.

Still nothing. In Windows, I set the recording device input as VAC and in SDR I set the device output as VAC. (per instructions above on this website). Stlll nothing. All I get on the Dos screen is : DIGITAL SPEECH DECODER 1.6.0 BETA WITH AUTO P25 & DMR FILTER
MBELIB VERSION 1.2.4
AUDIO IN/AUDIO OUT DEVICE:/DEV/DSP
and with a flashing curser under that. Nothing is heard. Not sure what is happening. Signal is strong and loud too.

Try this as a test: Get windows stereo mix setup, and disable VAC and set stereo mix as your default sound device and set the volume loud enough to register on the volume meter. Go to my Signal Identification Guide page linked up the top, and try test DSD on the example P25 and DMR audio examples. You should see some text scrolling. Then test it with Stereo Mix on your live signal.

Also, try VBCable. I heard once about someone having trouble with VAC, and only VBCable worked.

VAC is my default device. I also tried VB Cable and both are not giving me results. I am trying to get stereo mix set as default, but that is not an option. All there is for options is REALTEK HD AUDIO INPUT, VB-AUDIO POINT, and VIRTUAL CABLE 1. Remember I have XP so my Audio Properties box looks different than the one in your link. I will fiddle some more and try to get DSD to pick up the P25 sound posted here.

I did what you asked and DSD is not hearing the sound files even after enabling stereo mix. No scrolling. Although when I first started DSD, a quick burst of unknown something showed on the screen. Not sure what because there were no sounds at the time I started it. Frustrated.

Hmmmm the last troubleshooting things I can think of are to 1) double check volume settings for VAC/stereo mix are set loud enough, 2) Download a free audio editor like Audacity and set the record input to VAC/stereo mix and see what audio is actually being piped through. 3) Ask more people on the Reddit RTLSDR board, or the radio reference digital decoding forum http://forums.radioreference.com/digital-voice-decoding-software/.

I believe I have followed all of the steps correctly, however when I try to run dsd160.exe I get an “application was unable to start correctly” error message (this is on a windows 7 64-bit computer). I also tried “dsd -h” but dsd isn’t recognized. Any suggestions?

Hi, It looks as though just yesterday cygwin was updated and split into a 32-bit version and a 64-bit version. DSD is probably a 32-bit program so try downloading the 32-bit version of cygwin and using the 32-bit version of cygwin1.dll.

When I use SDR Sharp with my dongle to use as a regular scanner, I use the default sound card on my laptop and I hear everything I want. But when I want to use DSD to decode P25 per the instructions I change the input on my sound card to VB Cable and the output on SDR Sharp to VB Cable, I hear nothing. Is that a normal thing. Will I hear something through my computer speakers when the dongle picks up and decodes a channel with digital P25? Is it normal to not hear anything at all on my speakers when the sound settings are like so? Is that the whole purpose of VAC or VB Cable? FYI, I am using XP. Any insight would be a big help. Thanks!

Hi, yes that is expected. VAC or VBCable are used to silently send the P25 channel audio to DSD, which will play only the decoded speech audio through your speakers. Otherwise, it would be a pain to hear the undecoded channel at the same time as the decoded voice.

Great! Thank you so much for the quick response to a question that has been bugging me for a week! Great. Now I know my sound settings are ok. One other question. I am not sure of any other settings such as filter bandwidth, etc… I left all the settings the way SDR came out of the box. Are there any other settings I should change to tweak everything? So far it all sounds ok. Any insight? I will probably just leave everything like it was when I installed it. Thanks again!

Yeah try everything with defaults first, then fiddle with the filters later to try improve performance. Usually turning off the audio filter and reducing the filter bandwidth seems to help for me, but it’s hard to be sure.

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What is RTL-SDR

The RTL-SDR is an ultra cheap software defined radio based on DVB-T TV tuners with RTL2832U chips. The RTL-SDR can be used as a wide band radio scanner. It may interest ham radio enthusiasts, hardware hackers, tinkerers and anyone interested in RF.